Chocolate Jar with Iron-locked Lid

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Date:

1725/75

Artist:

Talavera poblanaPuebla, Mexico

About this artwork

Talavera poblana, a tin-glazed earthenware, was made in the central Mexican town of Puebla beginning in the sixteenth-century. The name likely refers to the majolica-producing city of Talavera de la Reina in Spain. Talavera emulated the designs of fashionable imported Spanish ceramics; like its Spanish prototypes, it showed the influence of Islamic, Chinese, Italian, and French ceramics, all present in cosmopolitan Spain during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries and transmitted to Mexico during the colonial period. This chocolate jar–with an iron cover, collar, and lock–would have been used to store valuable commodities like cacao beans. The blue-and-white ornamentation features panels composed of fringed curtains and scrolled leaves that frame long-tailed birds, a popular motif that may recall Chinese export Swatow ware.

Art Institute of Chicago, For Kith and Kin: The Folk Art Collection at the Art Institute of Chicago, 2012, cat. pp. 30–31.

Herbert Pickering Lewis (1876–1922), Mexico, from late 19th/early 20th century [correspondence in curatorial file]; by descent to his wife, Eva Lewis (died c. 1964), Mexico; given to the Art Institute, 1923.

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email .